


An Ending, A Beginning

by orphan_account



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Angst, Cancer Arc, F/M, Non-Explicit Sex, lotsa crying, sort of, txf
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-16
Updated: 2016-02-16
Packaged: 2018-05-21 01:43:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,304
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6033490
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Scully realises Mulder is in love with her and she is dying.</p>
            </blockquote>





	An Ending, A Beginning

Being brave is a choice. He looks like shit but he smiles as our eyes meet, crossing the room to my bed. I missed him last night, the sunflower seed on my bedside table a sign that he’d come as I slept. Being brave is a choice, and I don’t feel brave as my lip quivers when Mulder takes my hands and holds them to his face.

“Hi.” I whisper, brush my thumbs along his cheekbones. He’s gripping my wrists too hard, something’s wrong and I don’t want to ask.

“Were you okay today?” I’m dying and it’s getting harder to hope that I won’t. Today was a bad one, spent with my head in a sick bag and Mom hovering and teary.

“Just tired.” He’s nodding and he’s not here and it scares me when his hands on my wrist get tighter.

“Mulder, what’s happened.” He grimaces and looks right past me.

“Something fell through. I thought I was getting somewhere again but nothing is goddamn working.” His voice is low and his eyes are closed. His nails dig into me and I know I’m bruising. I say his name, twice, and he doesn’t hear me. I try to pull away,

“You’re hurting me, Mulder.” His eyes snap open and he lets go like my skin is burning his palms. I rub my wrists. _What am I doing to him_. Mulder is quiet for a moment, watching me with eyes like a frightened child and then his face just crumples and this horrible sob comes out of him. Heartache radiates through me as I pull him into my arms and his frame is shaking as he holds onto me. He’s murmuring something and I realise it’s my name only he’s calling me Dana and he must have realised that I’m really going to die. I don’t know what to do with this broken man who’s clutching me like a lifeline so I pull his head down to me and kiss him. It’s not sweet or soft like I had sometimes imagined it would be. It’s hard, it’s anger and pain and I need him closer even as our teeth clash and his tears fall down my cheeks instead of his. _I love you_ , I think as I pull the hair at the base of Mulders neck. _I love you_. I push him down, keeping my mouth on him because if he stops kissing me for a second I don’t know how I’ll handle it. _I love you_. I straddle his hips and he bucks up at me, groaning into my mouth. _I don’t want to leave you_. His hands are roaming my back under my shirt and it makes me shiver. I lower myself onto him slowly when it happens and my breath hitches in my throat. I kiss and bite his neck as he rocks up to meet me and he keeps whispering my name as we move together. _I love you_. I want to inhabit his skin. _I love you_. I try to imagine for the first time how I would feel if the situation was reversed. Is it worse to leave or be left? _I love you_. Mulder is clawing my back and we move fast and it hurts and I cry out my pleasure into his neck, his collarbones, his mouth. “Oh God, Scully. Oh God.” He moves into me deeper and deeper and then I’m quivering and my vision is starry and a moment later he groans and finishes and I’m just lying atop him exhausted and teary and he's holding me and I feel everything in the world but I also feel happy.

\------------------------

I am on my side and counting seconds passing. 2413, 2424. I have been awake for 32 hours. 2435, my mouth tastes like chemicals and I can see my heart beat in my eyes. 2446, I just want to disappear. Mulder walks in and I glance at him and it makes me lose count. He knows how bad I am today and he stands over me as he traces his fingers around my face. Over my lips, my eyelids, the line of my jaw. He brushes the hair from my face. I close my eyes and just feel his hands on me, why does everything lately make me want to cry. He is so gentle with me and I don’t know what he’s thinking. I imagine that it’s my funeral and there’s nobody there but him and my mother and they are looking around trying to understand. I imagine that a baby starts growing in my body and Mulder has something to hold when I’m gone. I imagine that I am going to ruin him and I already have. What a stupid, careless and cruel thing it is I’ve done. His fingers are still running through my hair. _Don’t cry, Scully_. I turn over away from him.

“Scully?” His voice is quiet. I clench my fists.

“Scully?” He takes one of my hands, unclenching it so gently, and he’s rubbing circles with his thumb. _What are you doing to him?_ I yank my hand away, like a Band-Aid.

“What are you..?”

“What do you want from me, Mulder?” I am out of my body. I’m up in the corner by the window and watching him flinch.

“What?”

“You have to listen to me. You have to listen.”

“I’m listening, Scully. What’s happening?”

“You have to leave. I want you to leave. I don’t know what you want from me.” He falters and I close my eyes because I don’t want to see anymore.

“What are you doing?” _Don’t cry_.

“We _work_ together, Mulder. I don’t know what you’re doing here. You have no reason to be here.” I’m breathing too hard and I dig my fingernails right into my arm and why won’t he just go. Why can’t he see that I can’t do this to him anymore and just go.

“Scully. Don’t do this.” He has never given up on anything in his life.

“ _Go_.”

My words just hover there in the room and I am so tired. I can’t give anything to him anymore, I have nothing to give to him but pain. The room is spinning out and I don’t know if it’s because I’m breaking my own heart or because my brain is destroying itself but I think Mulder is saying something. My body is flooding cold. I don’t know what’s happening until I do and I open my eyes and Mulder’s face is right there. He looks so worried and he just whispers

“Oh, Scully.” And I look down at the sleeve of his shirt turning red because he’s holding it against my bleeding nose. I’m so scared of dying.

“Just go, Mulder. Just go please, please. Leave me alone.” I hate crying but the tears are just falling out of my eyes.

“I can’t do that.” He whispers. I’m still bleeding onto his shirt. There has to be a metaphor there somewhere. I roll over and hold my own sleeve to my nose and I feel Mulder’s weight sitting on the bed.

“I don’t want anything from you, Scully, you’ve given me everything.” My lips are trembling and this pitiful whimper bursts from my lips.

“I know what you’re doing I just don’t know why you thought it would work. I’m never giving up on you because I can’t. Every good part of me is just you. Every good part of me is because I love you, Scully. I love you.”

I am well and truly crying now and keep whispering "I'm sorry" over and over and I pull him down and I just hold him so tight and he holds me tighter because that’s what we do. We two just hold each other because we always have.


End file.
